This is one of those times where I feel the need to mention that libraries (you know, the book kind?) had a multi language text encoding standard called MARC-8 25 years before the initial release of UTF-8. And what’s the “MARC” part about it? Oh, that’s the standard for encoding library catalogue records on magnetic tape
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in reply to @iliana's post:
sudden vibes of "M. Crispin, now that's a name I haven't heard in a long time"
finally! something to do with those parity bits we never bothered to actually implement error correction hardware for ( this might be a personal problem but also it keeps happening lmao )
bummed it's just 8 bit payloads with a continuation bit, all the neat little tricks that make utf-8 a prefix-coded self-synchronizing encoding that sorts lexically are missing
from THE YEAR OF OUR LORD TWO THOUSAND AND FIVE
what nonet machine could POSSIBLY still be relevant in 2005???
yeah I opened this and pogged for exactly long enough to notice the publication date :(
It's my favorite AFD RFC just because while it may be a gag it's a perfectly reasonable technical proposal that could be implemented on a real 18- or 36-bit machine with little trouble, complete with reasonable sample code.
in reply to @dog's post:
It's still so wild to me that I'm regularly reading catalogue records in a format invented to be used with PUNCH CARDS
It's been awhile since I've been in catalogue record land so I dunno if BIBFRAME ever got anywhere, but I love how every attempt at a MARC replacement has flopped. Legacy of magnetic tape lives forever.
My impression of BIBFRAME is it's something you read about in library school and will never actually touch unless you work for the library of congress.
It's certainly not going to make it into the ILSes of any other major institution. Public libraries are still using the 90s-as-fuck SIRSI Dynax Symphony Workflows sort of software, maybe Evergreen; and that ancient stuff is definitely not compatible with BIBFRAME. And wealthy Ivy League libraries have such large collections they will never be able to catalogue it all period let alone re-catalogue centuries of materials
Like idk you might as well try to switch the harvard library from LOC to DDC